At the close of this week's Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) trade summit in Beijing, President Barack Obama and Chinese President Xi Jinping pledged to cut greenhouse gas emissions and detailed an agreement that includes a renewed five-year commitment to supporting clean vehicle research efforts via the U.S.-China Clean Energy Research Center.

Oil prices have fallen in recent months, and Politico asked a group of energy experts what this latest market gyration might imply for U.S. policymakers. UMEI's John DeCicco was one of the experts queried; here's what he had to say:

The motor vehicle is at the cusp of being transformed by two threads of technology advancement. One is electrification, replacing gasoline and other liquid fuels with the direct use of electrons, enabling cars to plug in for some or all of their power. The other is intelligence, relieving humans of the error-prone task of driving through the connectivity, sensing and increasing automation, leading to vehicles that will one day drive themselves.

Officials from the U.S. Department of Energy, China’s Ministry of Science and Technology, faculty and students from the University of Michigan- led Clean Energy Research Center- Clean Vehicle Consortium (CERC-CVC) and industry partners met in Ann Arbor on August 11th and 12th to review progress on the initiative's joint clean vehicle energy research projects.

Transportation is one of several major sectors that contribute to climate change. Globally, the sector's roughly 25% share of man-made carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions is similar to its share of energy consumption. Because liquid fuels are so well suited for powering cars, trucks, boats and aircraft, transportation is uniquely reliant on oil, which is the best natural resource for producing liquid fuels.

This National Research Council (NRC) report assesses the potential to achieve twin goals of reducing petroleum use and cutting greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from U.S. cars and light trucks to 80 percent below the 2005 level by 2050.

ABSTRACT. Improving the fuel efficiency of automobiles (cars and light trucks) is an important means of addressing transportation oil demand and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. This report examines the efficiency attainable through evolutionary changes in U.S. automobiles that have fueling characteristics as well as performance, size and other attributes similar to those of today. The analysis combines results from previous engineering studies of powertrain efficiency and load reduction with new examinations of rates of technology change and cost reduction.

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Professor Violi’s research interests include chemical kinetics, biofuels, chemical and physical properties of fuels, lubricants, nanoparticle growth and assembly and nanoparticles interacting with biological systems for health assessment. We use atomistic simulations to study the mechanisms of interactions of various systems and derive predictive behaviors.